'Tis by Frank McCourt

"When I look at the framed book jackets on the wall at the Lion's Head Bar I suffer with envy. Will I ever be up there? The writers travel the land, signing books, appearing on television talk shows. There are parties and women and romance everywhere. People listen. No one listens to teachers. They are pitied for their sad salaries."
              -Frank McCourt, from the memoir 'Tis

The reading of this book was pure joy for me! I enjoyed it almost as much as Angela's Ashes so my rating is 5. Frank McCourt is suddenly one of my favorite authors.

When I mentioned to the Page Turners how much I had loved Angela's Ashes, someone asked if I had read 'Tis, a continuation of McCourt's life story in which he becomes a teacher. Since I am a retired teacher, I immediately put it on my "Must Read" list!

As a young man, Frank McCourt returns to New York, the place of his birth, from Ireland where he has spent his formative years. He had long dreamed of his return but finds it is not quite the promised land he had envisioned. Though he yearns for an education, he works many blue collar jobs and joins the army for a time, where he learns some useful skills. He is finally admitted to NYU even without a high school diploma. When he is able to acquire a teaching job, he finds himself questioning his choice of profession as well as his ability. In college he has shown a flair for writing and the dream of becoming an author grows more intense, as reflected in the quote above.

McCourt has certainly led a very interesting life, with a mixture of family loyalty and dysfunction, humor and sadness, so he has many stories to relate. Some tugging on the heart strings and other tickling the funny bone with his Irish humor. I love his practical and unpretentious prose; he doesn't even use quotation marks in his dialogue.

I will certainly read all of McCourt's work eventually but I am sad to find out he died in 2009. He left a fine legacy!